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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22412272">Aw, You Do Care</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister'>GretchenSinister</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Rise of the Guardians (2012)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Human, Getting Together, M/M, Sickfic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 14:35:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,373</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22412272</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/GretchenSinister/pseuds/GretchenSinister</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Original Prompt: "Human AU!<br/>Jack gets a cold (which is funny enough in itself), but that then leads to a sinus infection, which then spreads to an ear. So now his ear hurts, his sinuses ache, his throat is very sore (from both the drainage and the coughing), and his nose is dry and feels rubbed raw from blowing his nose so much. Bunnymund decides that Jack didn’t take care of himself well enough and decides to do it for him.<br/>(and before anyone tries to say that it’s unrealistic for a cold to lead to sinus infection to lead to ear infection, this is my current situation and it is SO FREAKING IRRITATING. GAH.)<br/>so yeah, no smut necessary (though I’ll never turn it down!)"</p><p>Jack’s sick, Bunny takes care of him, this leads to them confessing that they like like each other.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>E. Aster Bunnymund/Jack Frost</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>165</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>JackRabbit Short Fics</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Aw, You Do Care</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Originally posted on Tumblr on 8/17/2016.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><div class="text post-content">
  <p>“Hey! Open up!” Bunny knocked rapidly on the apartment door. “Your boss called me because you left him a voicemail that said you were fucking dying! What the hell are you doing?”<br/><br/>His phone buzzed. “Spare key under the mat” read the text.<br/><br/>“You’d better be joking, you had <em>better</em> be joking,” Bunny muttered to himself as he lifted the mat. It said “Ice to see you!” while also depicting the cheery face of a snowman, in the brightest colors possible. Jack had had it in front of his door for about ten months straight now, and it had been inappropriate for nine of them. And it did conceal a spare key.<br/><br/>“Damn it, Jack, we’re in a city,” Bunny said to himself as he unlocked the door.<br/><br/>“Hi,” croaked Jack from the depths of his couch.<br/><br/>Bunny folded his arms and looked down at him. Or, well, at his face and the pile of blankets beneath that. Jack was paler than usual, except for his nose, which was totally red, and he was covered with what looked like every blanket he owned, and a few he didn’t. “Hi,” said Bunny. “Is that Sandy’s blanket?” He pointed to a fuzzy blanket in shiny gold that, if he was correct in his guess, would nevertheless feel softer than—well, Bunny didn’t even know. Kitten fur? It was the kind of blanket that only people who had their shit together bought. There had been matching pillows for it at Sandy’s house.<br/><br/>“They wouldn’t mind,” Jack said. “I took it for emotional compensation of the fact that they’re dating a weirdo. Also it was a lot colder in the morning than it was the night before.”<br/><br/>“That’s what happens when you sober up,” Bunny said. “And you’re so lucky that you’re not just hungover right now. I would have kicked your ass for making me leave my house before noon on my day off. As it is…” He looked down at the pile of used kleenexes, the mostly empty bottle of blue gatorade, and the remnants of various over the counter cold medicine packages. “I don’t think you’re actually dying,” he said.<br/><br/>“So you won’t make me an omelet as my last meal?” Jack asked.<br/><br/>Bunny sighed and didn’t answer. He looked at the almost-empty kleenex box, shook a box of daytime cold tablets, stalked over to the bathroom and peered in the medicine cabinet, and assessed what was supposed to be the linen closet. “Is it just a cold, anyway?” he asked.<br/><br/>“Um, well…judging by how I feel—and I’m not exaggerating now—it seems like it’s probably also a sinus infection…and an ear infection.”<br/><br/>“But you don’t know for sure because you haven’t gone to the doctor.” Bunny folded his arms.<br/><br/>“Like you would, either,” Jack muttered.<br/><br/>“Right.” Bunny went to the kitchen and came back with a glass of water. “Stay here,” he said, and left, locking the door behind him.<br/><br/>“I’ve been abandoned,” Jack sadly told the pillows surrounding him, then reached out a questing arm for the glass of water.<br/><br/></p>
  <hr/>
  <p><br/><br/>“First of all,” Bunny said when he came back, carrying three large shopping bags, “I don’t want any snarky commentary on this. I mean. I’d still stay. But I’d be pissed off.” Jack offered him a little smile and Bunny set his bags down in a huff. He picked the remote from the coffee table and tossed it toward Jack. “Now stop acting like you’re dying and put on some Netflix. You can watch that stupid ghost show and I won’t say anything.”<br/><br/>Jack did. And Bunny went about unpacking the shopping, not looking Jack in the eye as he stocked gatorade and real orange juice in the fridge, stacked herbal teas on the counter, cleaned and filled water bottles, washed and dried the dishes, put on a pair of rubber gloves and put all of Jack’s kleenexes in the trash, put a new box within easy reach and three more in the closet, consolidated all the cold medicine and put that, along with some medicine specifically for ear infections, also within easy reach, and made tea.<br/><br/>Jack found himself less interested in the adventures of the ghost hunters than in watching what Bunny was doing. He was, well, going very much above and beyond what Jack had expected or even hoped for, and he didn’t know what he was going to do if Bunny did something extreme, like his laundry.<br/><br/>But this wasn’t what Bunny did. “All right,” he said, interrupting the show, “it’s time to clean your sinuses.”<br/><br/>“That would take magic,” Jack said.<br/><br/>“I’m a wizard,” Bunny replied, and waved a tiny blue plastic teapot at him.<br/><br/>This was highly unusual behavior for Bunny, and so Jack followed him to the bathroom, where some little paper packets and a gallon of distilled water waited. “So what have you got there, anyway?” he asked.<br/><br/>“It’s called a neti pot,” Bunny answered.<br/><br/></p>
  <hr/>
  <p><br/><br/>“But it helped, right?” Bunny wiped down the bathroom counter while Jack sat on the closed toilet.<br/><br/>“I feel <em>different</em>,” Jack said. “But then again maybe that’s because you just made me inhale a cup of saltwater!”<br/><br/>“You’ll be fine.” Bunny tossed the towel into a hamper. “And it will help. You saw all that snot coming out, right?”<br/><br/>“Yeah,” Jack said after a pause. “That was pretty cool.”<br/><br/>“Exactly. Now go in your blanket pile again, you look cold. And put this where your skin is raw.” He handed Jack a small tub of aquaphor before continuing to organize the bathroom.<br/><br/>“All right,” Bunny said upon entering the living room. “I only have one more thing, and then—then it’ll be lunchtime, I got some chicken soup when I was out, and that should be good, and then—”<br/><br/>“Bunny,” Jack interrupted him as he approached the couch with one more shopping bag. “You know, this is a lot more than I expected. Even if the neti pot thing seems like something you made up to get back at me for other pranks.”<br/><br/>Bunny froze. “Uh. Here,” was all he said, and he upended the bag over Jack. What came out was fluffy, blue, and had snowflakes printed on it.<br/><br/>Jack unfolded it, his eyes growing wider. “You got me a snuggie,” he said in awe, and immediately sat up to put his arms in the sleeves. “You got me a snuggie with a cute pattern!”<br/><br/>“Uh, well, so what if I did? It seemed like you could use one. Anyway, you’re—you’re the one who put me down as your emergency contact!”<br/><br/>Jack became very interested in adjusting the snuggie. “Oh, I, uh…thought you weren’t twigging to that since you hadn’t said anything so far.” He knew Bunny had folded his arms in the silence that followed. “Would you believe it was a joke?”<br/><br/>“No,” Bunny said. “Even you wouldn’t put someone as an emergency contact for a joke.”<br/><br/>Jack pressed himself back against the pillows, hoping that if he was going red, the chafing on his face would disguise it. “I just…thought of you as someone I could count on, all right? And see? You’re here, so I was right! You do care!”<br/><br/>“Guess I do,” said Bunny, and sat down next to Jack. “Guess I do. But I would have liked to know a little earlier that you were thinking of me as your next of kin.”<br/><br/>Jack risked a look up, and found Bunny smiling fondly at him. “Uh, in the story in my head, this is the part where we kiss,” Jack said quickly.<br/><br/>“Hell, no!” Bunny said. “You’re sick,” he added on, before Jack’s face could fall too far. He bent forward, brushed aside Jack’s hair, and kissed his forehead. “Now I’m going to make you chicken soup, and then…I guess I could keep hanging out here.”<br/><br/>“Yeah, I’d like that,” Jack said, thanking his cold for preventing his voice from suddenly getting squeaky. “And, uh, you definitely don’t have to do anything else around my place.”<br/><br/>“Yeah, but I’m going to,” Bunny said. He smirked. “After all, if all we do is hang out, I’ll probably end up getting sick, too. And then who’d we call?”</p>
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